Overfishing Is Worse Than We Knew

A new study claims overfishing is a bigger problem than official UN numbers would lead you to believe. (AP Photo/Eugene Tanner, File)

(Newser)
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Global overfishing might be much worse than previously thought, Discovery reports. A new study finds that UN figures have vastly understated the problem and that yearly fish hauls are declining three times faster than realized. According to the study, the UN—using numbers from the Food and Agriculture Organization—stated that global fishing peaked in 1996 at 86 million metric tons, but the researchers say it was actually closer to 130 million metric tons. Since then, the study claims the total amount of fish caught has declined by 1.2 million metric tons per year—not 0.4 million metric tons as the UN had said, the Guardian reports. “Our results indicate that the decline is very strong and is not due to countries fishing less," study author Daniel Pauly says. "It is due to countries having fished too much and having exhausted one fishery after another.”

The study, which was published Tuesday in Nature Communications, is based on a decade of work by 400 researchers around the world. The numbers used by the UN come from the self-reporting of more than 200 countries and territories, and governments might not always be inclined to give accurate fishing counts, notes the Guardian. Researchers undertook a "Herculean task" to get more accurate counts for the years from 1950 to 2010, says one professor not involved with the study. “The world is withdrawing from a joint bank account of fish without knowing what has been withdrawn or the remaining balance,” Pauly tells Discovery. And while the Food and Agriculture Organization disputes the study's new numbers, it does agree with its conclusion that countries need to improve their reporting, according to Science. (One particularly devastating technique: bombing fish out of the water.)

I don't like the look, smell, nor the taste of seafood. I'm not part of the problem.

Ezekiel 25:17

Jan 20, 2016 12:29 PM CST

The Asian nations take what they want without regard to seasons and recovery cycles. So they fish out the waters and even local fishermen have to buy bigger boats so they can travel hundreds of miles for the daily catch. Take yellow fin tuna that Japan has over fished for decades. They don't care, the shortage just drives up prices. I was told on a fishing trip in the Gulf of Mexico that if anyone of us caught a yellow fin we were to quickly take it into the port and sell it for huge profits. A medium sided tuna could bring $30,000 and they Fedex'd it right away to Japan. Blue fin tunas can sell for millions but we aren't going to catch one in the gulf. That demonstrates how bad things are.

LoLzS

Jan 20, 2016 10:47 AM CST

ANSWER = Less humans.. We have far too many in most countries that are on the streets, yet we keep on reproducing..... Well, it is gonna end one day....